All right, let's go before the Lord and pray and ask for his blessing. Heavenly Father, we come again to praise you, worship you by the teaching of the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. What he has done for us to save us from our sins. We thank you, Lord, for this. We have gathered around the hearing of your word that you may speak to them also. May you speak to me as I attempt to tell your story. We thank you, Lord. We honor you for all things. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Ephesians 3, 1 to 13. and I've been kind of flirting with the new English translation. There are some areas that it translates better than even New King James, New American Standard and stuff and today I'm reading from the new English translation so everything is going to be pretty much the same, just one or two areas. Ephesians 3, 1-13 Paul says, for this reason I pour the prison of Christ Jesus for the sake of you, Gentiles, if indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, that by revelation the mystery was made known to me, as I wrote before briefly. When reading this, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not disclosed to people in former generations, as it has now been revealed to His holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, namely that through the gospel the Gentiles are fellow heirs, fellow members of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus. I became a servant of this gospel according to the gift of God's grace that was given to me by the exercise of his power. To me, less than the list of all the saints, this grace was given to proclaim to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches or unsearchable riches of Christ and to enlighten everyone about God's secret plan, the mystery that has been hidden for ages in God who has created all things. The purpose of this enlightenment is that through the church, The multifaceted wisdom of God should now be disclosed to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly realms. This was according to the eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confident access to God by way of Christ's faithfulness. For this reason, I ask you not to lose heart because of what I am suffering for you, which is your glory." And that's the word of the Lord. And for the title we have just one, Eternal Purpose Accomplished in Christ. Eternal Purpose Accomplished in Christ. And we'll begin this way, the believer, that is you and I, individually have a standing before God because of God's gracious election and redemption that is in Christ. They have a standing. But it did not end there. Both elect Jew and Gentile have the same standing before God because historically the Jews thought they were God's people and everybody else was lost. And they've been united together in the one person and by the work of the one person Christ Jesus having been made into the one new man, that's the language of Paul, made into one new man by the blood of Christ. So the death of Christ is what abolished the enmity and the separation that was between Jew and Gentile, of course, the elect. The law is what established that enmity because the Gentiles were not under the covenant of Mount Sinai, the covenant of the law, so the Jews thought they were superior because of that. They thought they were better than the Gentiles who did not have the law. But the problem was they did not understand the purpose or function of the law like many in our day who proclaim or claim to be law keepers or are trying to do the law. But as long as the covenant of the law stood, as long as Mount Sinai stood, then Jew and Gentile remained enemies and that means Gentiles would remain largely excluded from the covenants that had the promises of salvation because those covenants were given to the Jews. But the Jews did not understand what God meant by them. But the arrival of Christ made everything subservient to Him. All things had to answer to Him, had to find their fulfillment in Him, because He's the substance of all things. And so once Christ came, the covenant of the law had to be Abolished. It had to be made inoperative. And the Greek word there means, that is translated as abolished, means to cause something to lose its power or effectiveness. The blood of Christ, the new covenant in the blood of Christ made the law to lose its power or effectiveness. It has no more claims on the one who is in Christ. So it had to be made null and void because the law did not help the Jews with respect to salvation. If the law did not help the Jews, then it could never help you and I. They had it for hundreds and hundreds of years and yet they were not made better by it. So both Jew and Gentile could only be helped by God's grace in Christ because both are sinners. Which is the reason why Christ appeared and is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes Christ. Everything ends, finds its fulfillment, its meaning in Christ Jesus. But the Gentiles have been drawn near to God by the blood of Christ because traditionally we were considered the outsiders. It's the Jews who were deemed to be the insiders. But now by Christ we have been drawn near to God. But how far near? Are we two miles away from God? Two weeks away from God, how far near are we to God? We've been justified and sanctified completely, made saints, we have an inheritance with the saints. So even now we, now we who believe are no longer strangers and aliens, that's the language of Paul in Ephesians 2, but have citizenship rights To all things heavenly, God considers us as heavenly citizens. We have the passports. We have all the rights. So God is not trying to build a wall against us. And this status that we have is bestowed. It has been bestowed upon us It is not acquired, in other words, we were not looking for it, we did not work for it, and therefore we cannot lose it. The status that the believer sustains before God cannot be acquired by formulas of salvation or by trying to do commands because it is all of grace. Your doing of anything causes nothing with respect to your salvation. So you and I have no power to cause our salvation, and equally we have no power to revoke our heavenly citizenship. We can't. It's irrevocable. Your sin, your rebellion, not strong enough to separate you from the love of God in Christ. That's Romans 8. There's nothing in the created world, visible or invisible, Neither depth nor height, future or present, or the past, that will separate you from the love of God in Christ. We know by law that an underage child cannot revoke their US citizenship. They can't. If they were born as a citizen, they have no ability to revoke it. Even if they were to go before the court, they cannot revoke it. So you and I, have no ability, we have no rights to revoke our own citizenship that God has bestowed upon us. Okay, we can try. We can try. So as far as God is concerned, we are still children. He has made us children and still on a sippy cup, okay? That is what the Lord said. Unless you have been converted and have become like little children, become like children, okay? And why use that language? because little children have no title to any achievement. So all those who are born of God come to that realization that they have no title to any achievement with respect to their salvation. They have nothing to bring. So the gifts and calling of God are without repentance And that means cannot be revoked because God does not change his mind. God is not learning anything. He's not discovering that, oh yeah, I didn't realize she was that bad. I have to change my mind. No. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows you. He formed you. So those who say salvation can be lost, once someone says that, know that they don't know what they're talking about. They have not really understood the matter, the pieces of salvation. They have not understood who God is. They don't understand the covenants. They don't understand what Christ accomplished. So Christ is He who came and preached peace to us. And that is the good news of the gospel. You and I are the young and the restless, as far as God is concerned. But fundamentally, these are things that you really have to understand. because they are not spoken of with clarity in a lot of the preaching that you hear. The peace that Christ came and preached is the reconciliation that he made by his death on the cross. He reconciled you to God. And there's no peace where there's no satisfaction of your sin debt. It is false preaching to speak of peace apart of being in Christ. There's no one who has peace apart from being in Christ. The Bible says there's no rest for the wicked. And the wicked are not necessarily worse people than you or me, but it is those whose sins were not atoned for by the death of Christ. That is what it means to be wicked, as far as God is concerned. If your sins were not paid for, you're wicked. It doesn't matter how religious you are. And if you still remember the story of the tax collector and the Pharisee in Luke 18, the Pharisee seemed to be righteous. He came and talked about himself, things that are seemingly very good, but God considered him to be wicked. The one who was stealing the tax collector, that's what they used to do, just steal money from people doing taxes and getting rich on it. He was a righteous man. So as far as God is concerned, fundamentally is the issue of, are you in Christ or are you outside of Christ? Okay. So Christ made peace for you with God by the blood of his cross. See the connection. He made peace. How? by the blood of his cross. So this is a historical event. The cross is what made it for you. Nothing else can, okay? And so the true believer lives in peace, should live in peace, in the knowledge of that. And that's the purpose of you hearing the gospel, is to constantly remind you, you are not getting any more saved than you were two years ago. You're innocent. But the problem is you forget. Things happen. And you start introspecting and start doubting. So we have to come back and keep hammering that peace into you. You have to keep hammering it. And when you die, you die in that peace. And when you reach the shores of heaven, you reach with that peace or in that peace. So there's no peace in this world. Don't expect to have the kind of peace that Jesus is talking about. Not in this world. We have sickness, we have COVID, we have mortgages, we have politics, all the foolishness of this world. We never end, it doesn't matter. This has been happening. If God will give you a video recording of what was happening in Rome back in the days, you'll see the same foolishness, if not worse. Nothing new under the sun, that's what Solomon wrote. But Paul is writing to Gentile believers and says verse 1 of Ephesians 3. For this reason I pour the prison of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles. Paul defined this mission and this mission and responsibility was by the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord appeared, if you still remember, to Ananias in the book of Acts, in Acts 9, in a vision with a message to go and see Paul, who also had a vision. Whilst he was praying, Paul had been blinded by the Lord. that Ananias may go to him that he may receive his sight. I'm like, Lord, why do you have to send Ananias? You already know that Paul is blind. Why do you have to go to Ananias and tell him to go pray for Paul when after everything is said and done, if you was going to heal Paul, why not just do it? That's how God works. But Ananias says to the Lord, no, I can't go to see this man because I'm going to get killed. He has been going about killing people, but the Lord said, Acts 9.15, For he is a chosen vessel of mine to bear my name before Gentiles, kings, and the children of Israel. Paul, a chosen vessel of Christ. From when, when did Paul become a chosen vessel of Christ? He always was a chosen vessel of Christ. Even in the days of his ignorance, even when he hated God, even when he was killing Christians, still a chosen vessel of Christ. That's scandalous. And Jesus knew about that. Jesus always knew that Paul was a chosen vessel of His. And that is the election. Chosen in salvation and chosen to be an apostle to the Gentiles. And that means grace all encompassing in the life of Paul. And the reason Paul was assigned to the Gentiles was so that he would declare to them all the knowledge that he wrote in the previous chapters of Ephesians 1 and 2 and more. He had a message to deliver to them, a message to deliver from God. And he had no option but to declare that knowledge, to declare that content because he was a prisoner. He was in chains because of Christ. The language of saying a prisoner is saying, I don't have a choice. Necessity is laid upon me. I have to deliver what I've been given. I can't run away from this. So you and I are prisoners to Christ. We can't run away from salvation. We can try, try it. Try it. Try to run away from Christ. See how far you go. Jonah tried it. He didn't go that far. He still find himself where? In the universe. Try to run away from Christ. If he has paid for you, you're going to find yourself in the shores of heaven still. He'll get you. Why? Because it's not about you. It's about him. So a prisoner has not much options of freedom. And Paul was very purposeful to use that terminology because physically he also was in chains in Rome as he wrote, or when he wrote this epistle. In chains in Rome, but was free in Christ. And Paul was in chains. He had his freedom curtailed, diminished, cut back for the sake of the gospel. And God is able to diminish our freedoms for the sake of his gospel. And he does not apologize for it. And he has a million ways to do it. He will curtail your freedom. He will frustrate you. He will put you in the corner just so that he will do what he wants to do, that he may hammer some truth about himself that he wants you to know. And that to say, My point is that read all things through the understanding of God's sovereignty, not through the editorial pages of the talking heads on TV. They don't know anything. They don't know anything. They're just talking. They're getting paid to talk, but they don't understand the good of the Bible. So understand God's sovereignty because He is sovereign in every little detail. He is. Once you start seeing it, you see it. The more you see it, the more you see it. So Paul was greatly inconvenienced for the sake of the gospel to the Gentiles. And he explained his responsibility, calling, and suffering in Galatians 2, 6 to 9. Let's go to Galatians 2, 6 to 9. Paul says, but from those who seem to be something, Whatever they wear, it makes no difference to me. God shows personal favoritism to no man. For those who seem to be something added, nothing to me." Why? Why would Paul say that? He's speaking in terms of his authority, and if there were any who were doubting his office, his apostleship, and wanting to say, oh, you're not an apostle because You were not like Peter, James, John, and he says, no. Those people, in the bigger context of things, they added nothing to me. Why? Because Paul was complete in Christ. There's not a single person, there's not a single thing that you do that adds anything to you. If you're in Christ, you're complete. Even your attempt to obey or to please God, doesn't add anything to you, because they're already complete. You can't add anything to a glass that's already full. If you add more to something that's full, you're gonna dump out whatever was already in there. So you can't add to grace, you can't add to Christ. They added nothing to me. There's no one who adds anything to you. I don't add anything to you. I only declare to you who you are. It's complete. Verse seven, but on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter. So that's the Jew gentile thing there. Verse eight, for he who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the gentiles. And that is to say, it is God who was working in Peter and those who preached to the Jews, and it was the same God who was working in Paul. So the message did not change. No one had an advantage over another. And when James, Cephas, and that's Peter, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that had been given to me, they gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcised. So that was the division there in the work. And with young Timothy, let's go to 2 Timothy 1, 2 Timothy. 1 Timothy 1.8-12 Paul says, Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me, his prisoner, but share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the power of God, who has saved us and called us with the holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began." That's just way too important a statement. God is he who served. It is God who called us. We did not decide to come to God because someone invited us to church. Even if someone did, it is not they who invited you. It is God who did. He saved us, called us, and that not according to anything that we did. He called us according to his own purpose. It's about Him. According to His purpose, He has saved you for His own sake, but has now been revealed, verse 10, by the appearing of our Lord, sorry, but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior, Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. to which I was appointed a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher of the Gentiles. See that office again, where Paul was given responsibility to preach the gospel. For this reason, I also suffer these things. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep what I have committed to him until that day. served and called, purpose, grace given us in Christ before time began. That's crazy. This happened before time began. God always wanted to serve you, which means he always loved you before he created anything. Since God has been God, Like, if you want to do on a time scale, go back two trillion years or go back as far as you lose count, he always knew you exactly the way that you are. He never had to discover anything about you. Never. He already knew. So he purposed from eternity, he purposed to serve you and to bless you and to keep you. So there's nothing that can frustrate that. Not you, not me, not anything that will happen in this world. So that mystery now has been revealed in this gospel. The mystery of our life, Death abolished for us in Christ. Immortality given us, not in the way that God is immortal. But that is saying, the ones who are in Christ, death has no power over them ever, never again. You and I don't die. It's the flesh, the physical body, this container that gets buried. You just put on new clothes. The believer just puts on new clothes for glory, and then in the resurrection, this body is raised incorruptible. That's the reality that we are in Christ. So when you begin to think like this, suddenly all the issues of the world pale in comparison. You're like, why am I worrying about these things? Because truthfully, you don't belong here. So if we should suffer, may it be for the sake of the advancement of the knowledge of Christ, not for things that do not make anyone wise unto salvation. with foolish things or over foolish things because they are foolish things. You know who you are. In Christ, you never lose an argument. You never. Even if someone does not believe, it doesn't mean that you lost the argument. And this is the maturity that comes with knowing the truth. You do not become righteous by yourself, but you become someone who knows how to handle different kinds of situations. You become very mature and stable. Some battles are not worth fighting. Why? Because I know greater truths. But let's go to verse 2 of Ephesians. Paul continues and says, that's Ephesians 3, If indeed you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you, if indeed, if indeed. Was Paul doubting his audience? Why use the language of if indeed? This is a technique or a literal device, a communication technique. a way of speech or writing to provoke deep thought of the subject matter. So in this context, it is provocative language to engage their minds to the subject matter of God's grace towards them in Christ. He wants them to consider the matter deeply. They obviously had heard what he had said. So Paul refers them to the administration or stewardship of God's grace that was given him for them. That is God's message to sinners. His grace towards them. Their reconciliation to him as many as should be served and have been given ears to hear. That's the purpose of preaching. It's not to extract money from people. It is not to make people miserable by pushing hard on the commands of scripture. Because a lot of preachers don't know how to handle the commands or the imperatives of the instructions. The instructions are only coming here and now, but the message of our salvation, Paul says, was from eternity. The commands don't cause anything. They're given to those who are already children. And I have six children. I give commands, the same ones, 10, 15 times a day, and they get broken. But they remain children. Even after they've broken them, I still go to Walmart and buy them toys. I'm like, what? I'm the one who's crazy. How do you keep buying things for people who don't listen? And if I can do that, guess what? God does it even better. Your sin does not cause God to change his mind. He knows who you are. He knows your frame, that you are weak, that you are a sinner. He knows. So Paul now tells the Ephesians what this was all about. Because the gospel is content. I made that point earlier. It is not just some warm and fuzzy subject that does not have defined content. There's actually defined content. It has pillars like this house has pillars that hold it together. Once you destroy those pillars, you're left with nothing. A lot of the gospel preaching that you hear is more about buying couches and curtains and all kinds of furniture which things don't help with the foundation. The gospel is about the foundation and that foundation is Christ who is the cornerstone of all things. But here this verse three, Paul says that by the revelation, that by revelation, the mystery was made known to me. As I wrote before briefly, Paul says, the matter of my message to you came by way of God's revelation. He did not go to school for it, even though Paul was extremely educated. From some of the reading that I have done, Some commentators have said Paul had an equivalent of two PhDs. He was extremely educated. But to the matter of the gospel, he says, no, I did not get this from school. It came to me by way of revelation as he had said to the Galatians in Galatians 1, 11 and 12, where Paul says, but I make known to you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man nor was I taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ. Because that's the only way that the gospel comes to anyone. It is taught of God and is revealed to them by He alone. I always say this, I only declare the gospel, but even then it is by God's doing. I don't declare the gospel by my own power or my own wisdom. If there's any power, if there's any wisdom, it's God's power and wisdom. If you guys understand anything, it is God who is doing that. Just as the Lord was working with Paul as he was praying and talking to him in a vision, he was also working in Ananias at the same time. So he is sovereign, he is omnipresent, he knows all things. So the mystery was made known to Paul. And the mystery, the Greek word mysterion does not mean something that is hard to understand. but something that is only known by those who have been initiated into it. So you have to be initiated. So it's kind of cultish language. If you have a cult, if you're an outside person, you don't know what the cult is all about, you have to be initiated into it. That's what Paul is saying, that it was a mystery that he was initiated into by God. So the gospel is not hard to understand. It is impossible to believe if you are not born again of God. So the mystery has been made known and all true believers know the mystery. They understand it when they hear it. Okay. Verse four and five. When reading this, you'll be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ. which was not disclosed to people in former generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. So this mystery was made known to them even through Paul's writing. And in his writing and their reading of it, they would be able to glean understanding of his insight into this mystery of Christ. The mystery is about Christ. And it was not disclosed or revealed to people in the former generations. So God's people in the Old Testament did not know of this matter to the level, to the degree that Paul understood it. God did not reveal this to the Old Testament saints the manner that he did in the New Testament. And that means what you and I know or do not know is all of God's doing. He determines what you know and when you know it. But those who know of this mystery, it was by revelation. It was by revelation. That's the only way. Because even Jesus said that in Matthew 11 from about verse 24 and following, no one knows who the father is except the son. And no one knows who the son is except the father and to whom he wills to reveal him. God has the will to reveal Christ to a person. Without that, you cannot make head or tail of this business. But Paul, please tell us the mystery, verse six. Namely that through the gospel, the Gentiles are fellow heirs, fellow members of the body and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus. What is Paul saying? That was really some earth-moving statement in the time and day of Apostle Paul, given God's history with Israel and exclusion of the Gentiles. That was a scandalous statement to say. That was a dangerous statement to say. In our American context, it would be saying something like this. All illegal immigrants are U.S. citizens. And if all rights of citizenship, they can do everything that any American does. Someone who just crossed the border two weeks ago can run for office and become President of the United States. That's what they say. And you know that that would drive a lot of people crazy. Like someone just crossed the border from Mexico and they're already running for office to be governor of Ohio because they've been given citizenship. But that's exactly God's message. It's very radical, very shocking to the Jew. That was shocking to the Jew. How do you mean that genders are fellows with our Messiah? They have promises of eternal life with our Messiah. How can that be? So it drove the Jews crazy. The Judaizers were beating Paul and believers of Christ because of this very thing. And that's why they would come and say, no, Christ cannot be enough. You still need to add circumcision. And Paul says, no, because the Jews were trying to make Gentiles Jews. And Paul says, no, no, no, they are not Jews in the way that you think. If one is a true Jew, they're the one who has been circumcised in the heart by the Spirit of God, not circumcision of the hands. So this was very offensive, that Jews in general are one in Christ and they have the blessings of God. But I want you to pay attention to verse 6 of Ephesians 3 again, but I believe that it explains in some measure John 3.16. In the context of the world, John is writing to Jews who are believers. The whole Bible is written with a Jewish background. with the Jews who do not think that gentiles are included in this business. So let's read John 3, 16 and verse 17. John says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. Because the world was already condemned. But John was not saying God so loved the world that he gave the whole world an opportunity to be saved if they could just make up their mind. That's not what John was saying. What was being expanded were the boundaries of God's salvation from the Jews to also include the Gentiles. Because that salvation was coming to the Jews was already given in the understanding of the Jews. What was new was that God would come and expand the boundaries of salvation to cover even the Gentiles who were not looking for God. And the background of John 3.16 is Numbers 21. It's Numbers 21 verses 4 to 8. The nation of Israel has been mumbling and grumbling against God because they're thirsty, because they're hungry. They say, oh, we love this miserable bread. We are tired of eating this bread from heaven. We're tired of it. We put cheese on it, we grilled it, we fried it, we're just tired of it. Give us McDonald's, change the menu. Manna is what they were saying they were tired of. And the manna was a picture of Christ. And they were essentially saying we are tired of hearing about Jesus. Every day we get Jesus, we're tired of it. And God says, okay, I'm gonna kill you. So he sent fire serpents and they began to bite them and people were dying. And then God says to Moses, you make a bronze serpent and put it on a pole on a standard and whoever looks to that pole will be saved. The ones that God caused to look to the pole because not everybody looked. And the Lord Jesus comes and says to the world, He has come into the wilderness of this world where people are dying because of the fiery serpents of sin. Okay. And he says, God so loved the world in the context of numbers 21, because if you backtrack a few verses from verse 14 in John three, you're going to hear Jesus refer to the incident just as Moses raised the serpent in the wilderness. So shall the Son of Man be raised, so that whoever looks at him shall live. Just as Moses. So he's comparing two incidences. He has reference points. Reference point number zero is the wilderness experience for Israel. And Jesus comes and says, now I am the replacement of the bronze serpent. I am what the bronze serpent was representing. Just as what happened in the wilderness, people were dying and they were healed by looking. I have come to be lifted up just like Moses lifted the bronze serpent. Moses is the law. He lifted the bronze serpent, which is the type of Christ. So Christ was to be put on the cross by the law so that all who believe will look to him as the only solution for the sin that is built in them may live. And he was expanding now. expounding the boundaries to say, this experience of salvation is not limited to Israel in the wilderness. It has now been expanded to all the gentile nations, of course they elect from among them, who also are in the wilderness, who also are dealing with sin, that if they look, and when they look, they receive their salvation. Let me just say one more thing on that. The bronze serpent was dead. It was immobilized. That which was immobilized on a piece of wood is that which gave life. So Christ, when he has been lifted up, immobilized on the cross, it is he who gives life. You see the connection? So in this manner, so if you read the New English translation, it doesn't say, God so loved the world, it says, in this manner God loved the world, this way. But people don't know how to read anymore, you know? Because so is not only used to amplify the degree of something, it is for comparison, in this manner, this way, okay? So that's what is happening there. So John 3, 16, was speaking of a mystery to the Gentile inclusion. Okay? Gentile inclusion. So here it is again, verse six. Namely that through the gospel, the Gentiles are fellow heirs, fellow members of the body and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus. The Gentiles are fellow heirs. They have an inheritance with the Jews, are fellow members of the body and partakers of the promise of salvation in Christ Jesus and that is really a big deal as far as God is concerned. Big, big, big deal. Verse 7 of Ephesians 3, I became a servant of this gospel according to the gift of God's grace that was given to me by the exercise of his power. Paul then says, He became a servant of this gospel of gentile inclusion in God's free and sovereign grace. And his ministry to the gentiles like salvation was by God's grace and that is to say Paul was not deserving of it. I came to the states not to preach the gospel. No, at all. I came for college so that I would make more money. That's why I came to the States. But that was not what God meant. God meant for me to declare the same message. He would have kept me in Zimbabwe. He would have taken me to some other place. But he meant for me to be here. It's all of God's doing. So I wasn't deserving, I'm not deserving of God's grace to even preach. Paul says, even just being beaten up for Christ, he was not even fit for that. It was given him by God. It was imposed on him. Grace is imposed on a sinner because a sinner will never receive grace by themselves. It has to be imposed. So God has imposed his grace on you. You were not looking for it. You would run away from it if it was up to you. So much for people who say, oh God is a gentleman. He wants a relationship. Like you're going on a date with God. No, God is not a gentleman. And he's not looking for a relationship. He already has established us in Christ Jesus. So God's grace is made strong in weakness. God's grace is made strong in weakness. Verse eight. To me, less than the list of all the saints, this grace was given. To proclaim to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. Paul was always aware of his weakness and unfitness in all matters relating to Christ. He felt very ashamed of himself. He was very critical of himself, and in a very negative way, as one who was not worthy of God's grace. Therefore, he preached God's grace. Paul was very conscious of his sin. Consequently, he was also very conscious of his nothingness before God. He understood that he was nothing. Even his very best efforts, as he explained to us in Philippians chapter 3, that all the things that he considered to be important about himself, he considered to be lost and done. They were useless compared to the knowledge of Christ. So grace made that to him. Because of that truth, because of that truth, none is worthy of God's grace. Because if you can reject God's grace, it means you are worthy of something good. If you can reject God's grace, it means you have more power than God. Because grace comes with the full power and authority of who God is. You can't reject God's grace. It's impossible. If you are a recipient of God's grace, then grace you're going to receive. Here it is in 2 Corinthians 11. Paul says, If I must boast, I'll boast in the things which concern my weakness. If I should boast, It's only in things that concern my own weakness as a person. I should only boast about things that concern my weakness. That's what God wants to hear from you. If you should boast with respect to yourself, but when it comes to strength, you're going to talk about him. If it comes to weakness, you talk about you. That's the difference. And in second Corinthians, 12.9 to 10, that's a related statement on weakness and boasting. And this relates to Paul's vision, extraordinary vision that he had when he was caught up in the third heavens and he saw things that were not lawful to say, Paul says. I saw things that are not even lawful for me to say. And because of that, it was given me a thorn in the flesh to bifurcate me so that I would not exalt myself above measure. And then he implored the Lord to remove that thorn in the flesh. And he says, I implored the Lord three times to remove the messenger of Satan that was sent me to bifurcate me to keep me quiet, to keep me humble. And the Lord said, 2 Corinthians 12, 9-10, My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength or my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, most gladly, Paul says, I would rather boast in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore, I take pleasure in weaknesses, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses. For Christ's sake, for when I am weak, then I am strong. That's the dichotomy of the believer. When they are weak, then they are strong, because his power is made strong in your weakness. God does not want strong people, because he is their strength. Filling your weakness because of a sin is the way to strength in Christ. Don't beat yourself up when you battle with your sin and you are constantly seeing that you don't measure up. It's not a sign that you're not served. It's a sign of your weakness. That's who you are. You will never measure up. Try. All you want. You will never measure up. Our sin does not make us antinomians or antilaw. It just amplifies to us the grace of God. That's the point of sin. The point of sin is for us to see what grace is. You could never appreciate grace outside of sin. Feeling of blindness is the way to vision, to sight in Christ. The one who is blind longs to see. And if you already see, Jesus says your sin remains because you are claiming to see when you are still blind. Filling your crooked walk is the way to a straight walk in Christ. because the work is not yours, it's His. He already represented you in everything regarding righteousness. Christ does not strengthen the hands of the strong, but of the weak, the withered hands, those beaten down to hopelessness on the road to Jericho by the robbers. You still remember the story of the Good Samaritan. It is there that the man who was walking, the good Samaritan, from Jerusalem to Jericho, they saw the man and had compassion. Christ is not going to have compassion on one who is righteous in themselves. Remember, he did not like those who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and he taught them parables. He derided them. He squatted them. He even taught parables about them and against them. And still does. He does not like the self-righteous. He hates that. God does not have problems with only one kind of people. Sinners. Sinners. Read the account of Jesus. Jesus has no problems with sinners. He has all problems with the self-righteous. So Paul says this grace was given to proclaim to the Gentiles their best life now or the purpose-driven life. According to Mr. Osteen and Rick Warren, he's the purpose-driven guy, purpose-driven life guy, they are reading the script of Jesus wrong. Paul says, the grace was given for him to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ. You would think that riches would be outside of the rich of the poor, especially in this natural world that we live in. How can you bring a message of riches to people who have no ability to pay or buy them? You are not a Jeff Bezos or the Mark Zuckerberg or the Warren Buffett, Bill Gates people. They can buy little islands and stuff do whatever they want. Big yards, big private planes and stuff like that. So what they have access to is inaccessible to us because we are limited in our own resources. But the gospel message was given to him to proclaim the riches, the unsearchable riches. You would think that would be very expensive to you. No. they are very accessible. Accessible by grace. The riches of Christ are unsearchable, both to their abundance and quality. Because in this world, the very ultra-rich people, there are not that many of them. They control much of the wealth on this planet. And yet, in Christ, every believer, even one who doesn't have a penny to their name, is rich. That's what God is saying. There are unsearchable riches in quality and abundance but the respect to total forgiveness of sins, and that means justification, your sanctification, your reconciliation with God, your peace with God, adoption as children, and inheritance with the saints, with everything that belongs to Jesus. Now, what does not belong to Jesus? He says, all power and authority has been given to me. He created all things. The Father loves the Son and has given all things to the Son. And so you are counted among those who inherit all these things with Jesus. And Jesus does not need anything. He does not need anything. So no amount of Amazon or apple stock will get you an ounce of that. No amount of Amazon or apple stock will get you an ounce of what Jesus gives you. Because what it gives you respects a different realm of existence. There's a quality to it that is unmatched by anything that you could have on this planet. But God has freely given those riches to you who believe, and that means grace, and grace and more grace. And that's God's message, the mystery of Christ revealed. But Paul was not only to proclaim the riches of Christ, verse nine, but also to enlighten everyone about God's secret plan, the mystery that has been hidden for ages in God who has created all things. That is the essence of gospel preaching, to declare God's secret plan, that he has made known through the gospel of Jesus Christ. That is the only way to know and understand history. Because history is the unfolding not of policies made in Congress, made in the White House, but of God's sovereign will, God's wisdom and purpose. All things in the world are in service to the continuing unfolding of that mystery. So nothing that men and women do will stop it. If anything, men and women are only doing such things as advance the fulfillment of that mystery. Whatever anybody is doing, They're just, they're not causing anything. They're just marching through the unfolding of God's purpose in Christ. This ship is going somewhere. But for the world, the somewhere is not good. For the believer, the somewhere is very good. They're going to glory, that's why they're marching. Everybody is marching. Everybody is on some concourse somewhere. They're in some departure lounge somewhere. Everybody's marching. Others marching to damnation, and some marching to glory. Ephesians 3.9, again, some translations say this in Ephesians 3.9, like the new King James and the KJV, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ. If you do some reading and search on the matter of the translation of the text, those who claim to know better with regards to the issues of translation and the passing on of the manuscripts who say there are some issues in some of the manuscripts they don't have created through Jesus Christ. But we have no problems with the inclusion or exclusion because we affirm as taught elsewhere that God created through and by Christ Jesus. If you don't agree with that verse 9 Or you can't run away from John 1. You can't run away from Hebrews. You can't run away from Colossians. It's still Christ who created or God created through Christ Jesus. So we have no qualms with that at all. Inclusion or no inclusion, it has not changed our understanding of who God is and how he has done things. But why did God, why did Paul reached back to God's creative activity when he was discussing the matter of salvation. Because he says, the God who created all things through Christ Jesus. Why do you need that extra detail? Because he's raising the level of understanding, he's trying to raise them up to the scale of importance of this matter of salvation, because creation is a big deal. Probably, in the physical sense, that's the biggest thing that has ever happened in the matter of created things. And Paul is saying the message of grace is, to that level, any better, because it respects things that do not perish. is immortality, is eternal life. By the same God, we created all things, through Christ Jesus. Okay? First then, the purpose of this enlightenment is that through the church, the multifaceted wisdom of God should now be disclosed to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms. The church is the medium of the revelation of God's mystery or God's knowledge. The revelation of God happens in the context of the gospel. Christ Jesus reveals God. When you've seen me, you've seen the Father. So Christ is the revealer of God. And he reveals God in the context of your salvation. And that happens also in the church body, but the church is the gathering of those to whom Christ has been made known, to whom God has revealed himself. So the enlightenment was through the church, through the gospel, not through Mohammed, not through all these intelligent philosophers who have some word, they'll go on opera, They will come with some very interesting concepts. There's a DVD series that Ella and I used to have, The Secret. Did you ever like The Secret? There's a lot of seemingly very useful things. I think it was on opera, or if you watch it, we don't have it anymore. We threw it out because the Lord showed us the truth. But it's very appealing when you're ignorant. Once you get open to the secret, supposedly, you get to all the knowledge that you really need to be the better you to access all the things that you can access in this life. But no, that's not the truth that we need. The truth of God has been revealed in the church in the context of Christ. We measure everything by what God has taught us through Christ. But I want to bring attention to the word that is translated as manifold wisdom. Manifold. The Greek word means variegated. And it refers to the beauty of an embroidered pattern or a variety of colors in flowers. You have flowers that have a variety of colors. Variegated leaves. And that's the same word that James uses when he says, my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials. It is manifold trials. Trials of different colors, of different stripes. So God's wisdom has different colors. It's variegated. it shows itself in ways that are past finding out. So like in the context of your guy's wedding, whoever thought that you'd have a pastor, a cool pastor from Zimbabwe, but God knew it's his wisdom, okay, that we are now just a snippet of what he's doing. Just as Jeff speaks to the diverse trials, variegated trials, manifold trials, God brings trials of different colors so that he will show his wisdom, his manifold wisdom in the different colors of the trials. Because without that, you would not know that he is sovereign over this little thing, over that little thing, and he just does some crazy things, he does. He gives me a child with 10 fingers, has one of them cut so that he would put it back. I mean, why have it cut? You're sovereign already. No, he wants it cut so that he can show you that he can put it back. And he put it back. My son has his perfect finger back, even though it was cut in half. So the medium of the revelation of God's wisdom from eternity is found in the doctrine of Christ, in the church, in the teaching of the gospel. God is displaying, He's disclosing His wisdom also to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. Because the cross of Jesus was a cosmic event. When Christ was on the cross, there was more stuff happening in the spiritual realm than what people were seeing at Mount Calvary. Because He was taking down principalities and powers As Paul says here, he was showing his wisdom to rulers and authorities, and that speaks to the angelic realm. God is teaching them something. And part of that mystery was that Jews and Gentiles are one body in Christ, the mystery revealed to the apostles and prophets, so the angels know that they are Jews and Gentiles. but they just didn't know how the pieces came together. Okay? And God did all that so that the angelic beings would marvel at the wisdom of God. Maybe angels thought that since the fall, God was going to condemn all men. They didn't know what God was going to do. They thought all these people are hopeless. They didn't know Christ was going to come in the flesh. They didn't know that. That is why in the Garden of the Garden of Eden, with the man who had the legion of demons, he said the demons were speaking through him. He said, we know who you are. Have you come to destroy us before our time? What are you doing here? You're messing up the party, Jesus. What are you doing here? They were surprised to see him there. So to say, they were surprised, they didn't know, but that's what God was doing. Here this is 1 Peter 1.12. I think I'll need about 10 more minutes or less. 1 Peter 1.12 to that point. To them it was revealed that not to themselves but to us they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven things which angels desire to look into. The matter of the gospel are things that angels desire to look into. It is something that they seek to understand. If they could, they would want to sit here and hear this matter. Can you believe that God kept this matter out of the view of angels, holy angels? intelligent, powerful creatures, clueless about the matter that you and I are speaking. And yet God communicated this truth to lowly creatures, that is you and me. And that is to say, angels just like us can only know and understand what God gives them to know on a need-to-know basis. There are many things that we think we know or understand about ourselves, about our life, about what may have happened or is happening that we actually don't have a clue. We think we know, but we don't until God gives us the real view of what was happening. We don't know. But God's purpose from eternity was always for Jew and Gentile to be one body in Christ and of course according to his gracious election. But his plan was to create a dividing wall between them and then later to reunite them under one shepherd, Christ Jesus. And God hid this from the angels, he hid this from the Jews and even the Gentiles. But the Jews got too busy with the law, with the shadow, and missed the point that it was pointing to Christ, who is the substance. The Gentiles, on the other hand, were busy in false religion, and none of them cared for anything righteousness. But now, both groups have been united under the truth and banner of God's free and sovereign grace. and both with equal standing, as Paul says in Galatians 3.28, there is neither Jew nor Greek that is gentile, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And the reason why I'm hammering this is you're going to meet professing Christians who are so big on Israel, that they will tell you that there are two separate groups of God's people. That you have Israel on the one hand, and you have the Gentiles on the other hand. And God saves the Gentiles differently than the Jews. The Jews are saved by the law, and Gentiles are saved by grace in Christ. You're going to find that in a lot of professing churches. John Hagee and company and all these people, And it drives a lot of the political ideology and policies here in the United States, because that's the theology around it. It's false teaching. That's not according to Paul. Paul says the dividing wall is not there anymore. And the matter of which we speak, according to Paul, is spiritual. Jew and Gentile have been united in the one Christ with the one shepherd over his house, the church. So God was engineering the twists and turns. This is a point that I want to just make in reference to that. God was engineering all the twists and turns as his mystery was being unfolded or is unfolding. And he does that with our lives too. We live every day to see the new twist and 10 that he ordained. He unfolds it. Every day you're opening a page of the chapter of what God has written for you every single day. You don't determine anything. You're just walking through that unfolding of that mystery. Okay? So this word is not in free fall as some will say. Unfortunately, coming from professing Christians, professing Christians are supposed to know this. This world, this country, is not in the hands of Democrats or Republicans. They're just agents. They're instruments. It is in Christ who holds all things by the word of His power. All power and authority is with Him. It's not in the White House. He controls. These guys are just pawns in His hands. They're doing His bidding. Okay? Verse 11. This was according to the eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. So all of God's wisdom was according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ. So you see that God is not reacting to the events of the world. He is not reacting to you and me. God is not a checkers or chess player. And that means he's not waiting for your move to decide what to do next. He's not waiting for you to obey and then he will change his mind about a matter. You'll find out this to be true. You will see that even when you are very terrible and you have a bad week, month, or year, just things not working right, you're trying to be good. and you're not, and yet God will bless you still. I'm not lying to you. Things will keep working, and I'm like, but this is not supposed to happen, given everything that I've been doing or thinking. Yeah, it's not supposed to happen, because that's what grace means for God's child, okay? He's not like you and I. So he has a purpose in Christ. And of that purpose he says, I will accomplish all my good pleasure and no one will frustrate it. This purpose was accomplished, that's past tense, in Christ and it involved your sin as an instrument to that purpose. God could not have an eternal purpose in Christ which involved the cross, and the salvation of sinners and yet not be behind sin. Does not make sense to me. It is impossible for God to serve you from eternity as we read from Timothy. Why is he serving you if he wasn't thinking of sin? Why is he serving you? Because sin is part and parcel of his purpose in Christ. And this purpose was accomplished by the appearing of Christ through the cross. It's done. It's already accomplished. His purpose is done, signed and sealed. It can't be unsealed. Not by you. That's tough. And in this Christ, we have boldness and confident access to God by way of Christ's faithfulness. That is where The NET has a very faithful translation. It's also very good in Philippians 3. We have boldness and confident access to God by way of Christ's faithfulness, not our faith in Christ, but by his faithfulness. For this reason, verse 18, that's our last verse. I ask you not to lose heart because of what I am suffering for you, which is your glory." Paul says, do not lose heart because of my suffering in prison. I'm suffering for your sake and Christ's sake. But why not lose heart? Why not lose heart in the face of trial and challenges of life? That's the question related to that. Why not lose heart because of all that I've told you about God's mystery and purpose in Christ for you. It cannot be overturned. This is who you are. This is what you look at when things are seemingly not working. You have all these trials that you feel you're going to be buried You are being overwhelmed by them. Paul says, no, no, no, no. Look to all the things that I've told you about the mystery of Christ, how God accomplished your salvation in Christ. And so the true believer has hope in the knowledge of God's mystery and purpose. This is what brings them sanity. People in the context of this COVID, I've been very disappointed, to be honest, by a lot of preachers who are serving grace, leaning or serving grace and reformed. How might they have been overtaken by COVID in their theology to the point that they're not really standing on the rock in the theology of Christ. They're pushing a lot of conspiracy in a way that is not healthy for someone who professes to know God. There's no conspiracy for someone who knows this. Whatever any man or the so-called powerful people are doing, it's not conspiracy. They are doing exactly what God wants them to do. So that he would make them guilty and justly condemn them. As God's people, we don't glory in conspiracies. Yes, there are wicked people who are doing all kinds of plottings, evil schemings, and stuff like that. They are appointed to do that. But when we come in Christ, we have to stand up right and bring sanity to any situation. And say, no, no, no, no, no. I know whom I have believed. He's in control of everything. COVID or not COVID, there will always be something to deal with. You're dealing with the children of man. There will always be something to deal with. Yeah. So this matter that Paul has declared to us is what gives us a sure footing and for us not to be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine. Let us learn Christ, know Christ, believe Christ. Because in Christ we have boldness and confident access to God in the holy of holies. That's the idea here. We have confident access by way of his faithfulness. His faithfulness. He is so faithful that he says everything that needs to be said for you to the right quantity, level, quality, you name it. That's how faithful he is. When you and I try to speak to God by ourselves, in the strength of our own knowledge and power, as soon as I start praying, I almost took a self-effort or I was praying, And then I saw a scene that I wanted to take a picture of. I stopped praying and took my phone. I'm not even lying, I did it. This year, I am supposed to be praying. I'm like, oh, I'm going to go past this thing. I get my phone. And then I remember myself apologizing and saying, sorry, Lord. But that's not the faithfulness. Christ does not do that. Christ does not get distracted to the matters that really matter. That's what Paul is saying. We have confident access to God by His faithfulness. Freedom of speech and freedom of movement is what is entailed in those words. Boredness of approach. We have the freedom of speech, and we have the freedom of movement before God. That's what Paul is saying. You have the freedom of speech. Like the prostitute who was wiping the feet of the Lord with her tears and hair. That's the kind of access that we have been given. She did not receive a rebuke from Jesus. Even though she was that intimate with Jesus. That's the kind of access that we have, the boldness that we have before Him. Even though she knew she was a sinner, she still did that to the Lord. And yet was not turned away. So Paul says, come boldly, therefore to the throne of grace, that you may find help in the time of need. Do not lose heart. Whatever's happening, it is God's doing. It is God's driving all things to fulfill his eternal purpose in Christ and even your glory in salvation. We are done. Amen. Let us pray and then I'll talk some more. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we thank you for these many words that you've given us by the pen of Paul and by the teaching of the Holy Spirit to enlighten us to the matter of the mystery of Christ and God's purpose that was accomplished in him for his people, that we have an inheritance with the saints, Jew and Gentile, one human, one body, one household of faith in Christ, having the same inheritance. We thank you, Lord, for granting us the opportunity to come and gather around and hear these wonderful things of your eternal purpose in Christ Jesus. Lord, we pray and honor you for all things. Be with us always in our going in and out. May you strengthen us in this evil world. We pray and honor you in Jesus' name. Amen. The good thing is I've forgotten what I was going to say. It's called sovereignty.